Khalid obtained his Ph.D. with Prof. Chad Mirkin at Northwestern University in 2006. During that time, he studied the electrochemical properties of organic adsorbates patterned onto gold films and developed massively parallel scanning probe lithography approaches. From 2006-2009, Khalid was a postdoctoral scholar with Prof. Jay T. Groves at UC Berkeley. As a postdoc, he developed electrostatic-based approaches for DNA microarray readout, and also investigated the role of EphA2 (RTK) receptor clustering in modulating cell signaling. In 2009, Khalid started his own lab at Emory University, where he currently investigates biophysical aspects of receptor-mediated cell signaling. To achieve this goal, his group has pioneered the development of molecular force probes and nano-mechanical actuators that are integrated with living cells. These materials are used to investigate the molecular mechanisms of a number of pathways where piconewton forces are thought to be important. These pathways include the Notch-Delta pathway, T cell receptor activation and the integrin-based focal adhesion pathway. In recognition of his independent work, Khalid has received a number of awards, most notably: the Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship, the Camille-Dreyfus Teacher Scholar award, the NSF Early CAREER award, and the Kavli Fellowship. Khalid’s program is supported by NSF, NIH, and DARPA.